How Many Jobs Are Needed to Keep Up with Population Growth?

The press quotes all sorts of figures for the number of monthly job gains needed to keep up with population growth. We see numbers like 80,000, 100,000, 125,000 and 175,000 thrown around like statistical snow as the number of jobs needed each month just to keep up. What's the right one? How many jobs are needed each month just to keep up with population growth?

The actual monthly amount can be calculated and the Atlanta Fed even did us a huge favor by publishing an interactive monthly jobs calculator so you can go check for yourself. This month shows we need 104,116 payroll jobs to maintain the same unemployment rate of 8.1% with all of the other same terrible conditions the state of employment is in.

That's the key, the current terrible conditions the state of employment is in today. One of the reasons the number of jobs to keep up with population growth is so low is due to so many having dropped out of the labor force. If we had more people being counted as needing a job, the number of jobs to keep up with population growth would be much higher.

To explain this, we need to go to BLS school and learn some labor concepts. The employment universe comes from the civilian noninstitutional population. These are people in the United States, aged 16 and over, who aren't in the military, infirmed or locked up somewhere.

The above pie chart shows how the civilian nonstitutional population is divided up into two classifications, either you're in the civilian labor force, or you're not. The employment statistics come from the civilian labor force. Those who are classified as not in the labor force are not counted, and thus not considered as needing a job or mattering when their numbers swell.

The civilian labor force is then divided up into two categories, either you have a job or you don't. In the unemployed category, you have to be actively looking to be considered as part of the civilian labor force. The above pie chart shows the breakdown, using the August 2012 statistics.

The civilian noninstitutional population grows every month and for 2011, the average was 0.059% per month. For the last 12 months, the average was 0.128% per month, so the population growth varies, but there is a huge problem. The woe is the Census puts their annual benchmark adjustments in the month of January only. The benchmark adjustments are not annually smoothed or averaged in on a month to month basis. This makes the monthly population percentage growth more difficult to estimate, for we have a fudge factor plopped in between the December and January estimates. We can see the annual benchmarks, or fudge factor, in the below graph showing the monthly change in civilian noninstitutional population.

What we can do is ignore the months of January and take the average growth rate for the last year, bypassing the benchmark weirdness month. Doing this gives a monthly growth rate of 0.0762% for noninstitutional civilian population and thus we smooth away those benchmarks to get a much more realistic average population growth rate.

If the fact that the benchmark adjustments are not evenly distributed across the monthly change in noninstitutional civilian population isn't enough to throw a monkey wrench into figuring out how many jobs we need each month just to keep up, we have an additional problem. There are people who really are not in the labor force and these percentages change. The population is getting older, we have more retirees and unfortunately we put people in prison more than any other industrialized nation. Then, other people are not part of the labor force because they have been unemployed so long they are no longer counted. In other words, we cannot say that all of the growth of those not in the labor force is due to people dropping off of the unemployed statistical radar. That said, clearly many are. Where we can see this most is in the labor participation rate. The labor participation rate is the ratio of the civilian labor force to those not in the labor force. The below graph shows we are at record lows in the ratio of those as part of the labor force to those who are not.

If we take the labor participation rate at the start of the great recession, 66%, we get a whole other number of jobs needed each month to keep up with population growth. If we keep the same rate of unemployment, 8.1%, we would need 545,551 jobs per month and it would take an entire year to get to the same August rate of unemployment, 8.1%.

This is because by increasing the labor participation rate 2.5%, we took 6,089,150 people not counted and added them to the labor force statistics and of course, they would enter in as unemployed. The unemployment rate is the ratio of those in the civilian labor force who do not have a job against those who who do.

We can also estimate the number of jobs needed each month, just to maintain, by rough numbers. If we assume a smoothed noninstitutional civilian population growth rate of 0.076% per month, then next month's population growth would be 185,617 additional people ages 16 and over and not locked up somewhere. If we then assume the labor participation rate of this new growth would be 68.0% and not the actual, artificially low 63.5%, we would get an additional 126,920 jobs needed to keep up with this population growth.

This is much more realistic for new population growth is probably going to enter the labor force looking for a job. The BLS counts illegal immigrants, green card holders and foreign guest workers in their statistics and most of the population growth is due to immigration. These people either already have a job upon entering the country, or are going to want one fast. Bottom line, yes Virginia, increased immigration does affect labor markets, all else being static. I do believe to say our economic growth and thus labor demand is static at the moment is not an understatement.

Finally our favorite and never reported BLS statistic amplifies the terrible situation for labor in this country. The BLS surveys people considered not part of the labor force and asks if they want a job right now. Below is a graph of the people who said yes and watch how this figure swells.

For August 2012, those not counted in the labor force but report they actually want and need a job increased by 403,000 in a month. That, folks, should have you horrified. Literally we have desperate and destitute people falling through the statistical crevasse, into the abyss where they can only shout out from the numerical darkness, yes I want a job!

There is a hard ratio of the CPS to CES survey to get the number of jobs including self-employed. Using the CPS survey we get 110,990, assuming the same terrible conditions as outlined. The Household, or CPS survey does count self-employed, but there isn't a lot of resolution and these days "self-employed" often equates with being paid below minimum wage, denied benefits and retirement. i.e. contractor, freelancer, "day laborer" and so on.

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We overview the data in this post, which has some maps on State and metro employment. If you follow the top link, you'll go to the BLS website which has more information, but you have to query their database as well as read their reports.

We always put at the first link the government site where you can find more information or the direct data from our overviews.

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The lower participation rates of the 1950's are due to less women in the workforce. Beyond the social issues here, the reality is today one needs two incomes to make it and that was not the case, even as late as the 1980's. After 1965 we started to get less discrimination which also increased the labor participation rates.

We are not misrepresenting this. I suggest you view our article on the breakdown of labor participation rates by age group, see our overview on when the 2010 Census data was incorporated, here. One cannot say the low labor participation rates are retirees when looking at the ages of 25-54, the prime working years.

I agree knowing the number of people retiring and therefore opening up their jobs to new graduates is an important number to subtract from the number or required/needed new jobs (but sometimes those jobs are not filled, so again it is hard to get correct numbers). I found this page because I'm running my own numbers.

Trying to nail down how many new jobs are needed just to keep the unemployment rate from changing is difficult. I believe economists agree 150k-250k new jobs per month are needed in a healthy economy, but because so many are quitting their job search, only around 120k are needed currently.

Some numbers to gain a sense of magnitudes:
4 million are born in the US annually. So that's 333k born monthly.
3.4m graduate high school annually (283k per month). Not sure how many look for work though - some might get married and/or be on welfare, be in prison; etc.
Out of the 3.4m HS graduates, around 1.7m or 1.8m graduate college annually (142k-150k per month). One would think almost all of them want to work, so that many jobs clearly need to be created each month (minus the number of people retiring).

Many people were basically forced to retire the past few years (many of my older friends at Lockheed for example They lay off almsot entirely those over 40 years old). Mostof those jobs won't be filled anytime soon, but they are hiring some college grads whom they otherwise would not have hired.

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This is why immigration should be drastically reduced. We cannot provide enough jobs, tax breaks, health care, business grants, food stamps, rental assistance, language classes, etc. for all these immigrants. I read there are over 100000 a month coming in! Many commit comes which costs us the cost of jail, court appointed lawyers, police costs, like the Mexican hit and run driver who hit my daughters car, had no license, no insurance, was stoned, did over 2000 in damage and he'll probably never pay for it. It was his 3 rd offense, driving without a license/insurance! Please help lower immigration before its too late!

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It's also false, statistically. If anyone was paying attention, GOP wants more guest workers, which clearly from the labor statistics we do not need. We need those jobs to go to U.S. citizens, the people already here.

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We need as many jobs that we had before we went into the Recession. We need for jobs to come back to the US. This is the problem. Businessmen have stated it over and over and over. You cannot OverTax
the Businesses that were here before the Recession. That is what made the Recession. We are in a
Depression and unless and until Congress stops ignoring these facts, it won't get any better.
Obama promised all these Greem Jobs. America is not ready to go completely Green. Its an IDEAL, but its not a fact. Businesses coming back to the US will have to have their Taxes Reduced until they can
get going again. Its too SIMPLE and Congress doesn't get it. If one more Congressman says they are
going to Fix WASHINGTON, I am going to throw up. Another 4 years of Obama playing around with the Economy
will not get it. He hasn't enough guts to put a Mandate on Congress. We need a Take Charge President. somebody that is willing to Stand up to Pelosi, Harry Reid and all the Special Interest Groups that keep popping in with their AGENDA. I am talking about the Overwhelimg Latino Population that decides what
they need and want. If we had a President that the American Public Liked and he would stop pandering to
everybody but the TAXPAYER--- he would find out that what has worked for hundreds of years, will still work. We can't have our Government fighting amongst themselves. We can't have a President that lets the Lobbyiest take over. President Obama said he would make a change, the only thing he changed was giving us
a Health Care Plan that he can't pay for. We are in debt Trillions of dollars. He never seems to mind that his Ideas are just good on paper and verbally, but nothing has transpired except the Debt. He has not done anything he promised. He now asks us to give him more time? For What. We don't hear any new ideas, just use the same ones a little longer. Are you kidding me.

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Look, media, esp. Fox news doesn't even report statistics accurately. On this site we try our damnest to be accurate because of that.

But trying to blame the left is just ridiculous, it is BOTH and it is NOT taxes which cost so many jobs, it is GLOBALIZATION, bad trade deals and the STRUCTURE of those business taxes.

BOTH PARTIES only do lobbyists' bidding and that is the problem, but don't think it's just Obama/Reid/Pelosi. It's also Boehner/McConnell/Ryan.

Then, if that isn't bad enough, sprinkle the other Senators and House leaders who sabotage important bills, add loopholes, refuse to regulate derivatives, enable stimulus funds to be offshore outsourced, refuse to put U.S. citizens in top priority for jobs and the list goes on and on.

Bottom line, if you want to fix a problem, it would be very helpful to identify the correct cause and we spend a lot of time on this, from the facts, statistics, not some rant du jour from some pundit.

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Population growth is a choice that Congress - not the American people - make. Eighty-two percent of all U.S. population growth between 2005 and 2050 will be due to arriving immigrants and their children, according to the Pew Hispanic Center. That is a federal policy that can be adjusted or regulated just like any other. But the feds choose to continue record levels of immigration despite the slow recovery.

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and it's also true the executive branch and Congress has the ability to limit immigration and it's also true they continually want to increase it. Worse still is the spin, which is as thick as a blizzard, that increased immigration adds jobs. No it does not, all things static. There is worker displacement, substitution with the immigrant labor instead of the worker who is already here. Worse still is the claim that we have a worker shortage. Every year we import millions of foreign guest workers and that's just obscene considering the high levels of unemployment. There is no skills shortage, not in any occupational category, including scientists, PhDs, engineers in this country.

Probably the most brazen example of the denial that immigration levels negatively impact those already here when there exists weak economic labor demand (high unemployment), is the refusal to reduce H-2B foreign temporary guest workers. Literally stimulus funds were used to hire H-2B foreign guest workers instead of those locally, in areas with 30%+ percent unemployment and in most cases, where the local area unemployed already had the skills and had been working at those jobs for decades until they were lost.

This site is non-partisan but the spin on immigration is beyond disgusting. One wants to blame Democrats since they are the party of illegals, but don't buy that. The GOP ALSO wants more foreign guest workers and also tried to claim the above. Why? Because corporations, foreign business and other nations lobby our politicians and make huge campaign contributions, all to get their unlimited supply of foreign labor which also happens to be a conduit to offshore outsource even more jobs.

Not all immigration is worker substitution but a lot of it sure as hell is, esp. these days with 28 million people in reality needing a good job. Lobbyists and their economist cohorts write fictional white papers, literally setting the worker substitution variables to zero in labor economic theoretical formulas, or removing these variables completely out of the equation. These people should be condemned for biasing their figures, same as a pharmaceutical company putting out bogus clinical trial data.

Of course only a few nerdy people such as myself can follow the mathematics and know they just trumped up some completely bogus assumptions and assertions to spin their results in these papers. You can bet politicians don't read that deep or read anything beyond the number on the check. Politicians' staff might read a glossy fictional one page flier from a lobbyist, complete with talking points to lift for speeches.

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The question is not "How many jobs are needed to keep up with population growth?", it is "What is reasonable population growth given the current job creation rate?". The answer right now is a big, fat ZERO, although this hasn't stopped our blind government from continuing to issue 1 - 1.5 million work permits to new immigrants. This is on par with having a birthday cake that feeds 20, but continuing to invite guests until the party swells to 500.... With all the talk of job creation and dismay over the unemployment rates, they are not doing the simplest, least expensive thing they can do ensure more Americans are employed. QUIT IMPORTING JOB TAKERS!!! This is too simple a concept for Congress to comprehend... or is it VOTES they're importing, and TECHNO lobbyists they're supporting while presumably actually believing that there is a shortage of technically skilled Americans??? All Americans, especially unemployed Americans should be making this their primary issue with their so-called representatives. That birthday cake only goes so far....

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Uh, not everyone who is unemployed would be offered (or take)a minimum wage job. A lot of people who are unemployed were making six figures. If they got hired (at six figures) and the government paid 50% of their wage, it would cost the government a lot more than it did when they were unemployed.

What needs to happen is to get rid of all the Illegal Immigrants who are driving down wages, filling minimum wage jobs that kids used to do after school (and the lesser skilled held full time), taking advantage of all of our government benies, driving up school and medical costs, lowering property values as they move into houses they have no clue how to take care of,...

Illegal Immigrants send BILLIONS of dollars out of our economy and back to their homeland. They have abused every financial loophole imagineable to rape this country financially of more billions while our government turns a blind eye.

Now that Obama has made the executive order in favor of the Dreamers, BEFORE doing anything to stop the flood of Illegals, you can bet things will only continue to get worse.

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It is small wonder that the employment rate cannot keep pace with population growth. The US government issues 125,000 green cards every month, no matter how many Americans are thrown out of work, lose their homes, or can't buy shoes for their kids. The US government is more interested in replacing US workers than it is in helping them find jobs.

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New Green Cards = Jobs Created. An equal level of both and that spells doom for the American Worker looking for a job.
Somewhere near the bottom of this hell, is a site called BPO (really). This offshore site brags it will find IT workers at 12 to 25 percent of the U.S. domestic rates for any position.
As a sweetener, it tells the corporate sponsor that no benefits of any kind will be paid.

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Back to the Future:
The Enterprise Fabrication Initial Public Offering

Starting with TEFRA in 1986, U.S. Tax policy changed from incentive based to a policy of rate cuts without incentives, with catastrophic results for the domestic U.S economy. Before 1986, the U.S.Tax policy had a Christmas tree of various incentives, many ill-conceived. A balanced policy would bring back incentives, keep incentives few and target the incentives to key economic objectives. Policy initiatives shifted to the extreme of the “flat rate” school now arguing for ending the Estate Tax, cutting the top Corporate and Individual rates and bringing the Capital Gains Rate to zero. The flow of funds offshore and the de-industrialization of the U.S. Economy is the case against the lat-rates school. Empirically, a drop in all tax rates has run parallel to the downward spiral of domestic industrial activity since 1986.

The tax policy bringing us Back to the Future of 1985 would raise the taxable floor for the minimum rates, increase the retirement deductions such as pensions and IRAs, and create a new class of IPO for equity investors. These changes will help negate the Fiscal Cliff for any and all serious about a revival of the domestic economy while avoiding the Carry Trade. Look no further than the published tax returns of many in the Political Class for a case against the Carry Trade (e.g. offshore accounts).

The Enterprise Fabrication IPO, EFAB gives incentives both to the individual investor and the corporate issuer. EFABs investment would be deductible from Gross Income, like retirement accounts for the individual. The corporate issuer would have the added benefit or repatriation of foreign retained earnings without tax, as long as the repatriation is bundled with proceeds of the EFAB IPO. The monies from both the IPO and the repatriation will be dedicated to domestic fabrication facilities, mostly those investments qualifying for the old Investment Tax Credit, with some new items. EFABs have a unique financial advantage over other IPOs. Besides tax incentives, the bundling foreign retained earnings with the IPO proceeds will cut the earnings-per-share dilution of every EFAB IPO in half.

EFAB Qualfying Targets would include:

Movies. No industry has suffered off-shoring quite like Hollywood. The EFAB would bundle the IPO targeted to multiple film projects with repatriation of foreign earnings by Hollywood, so long as the film is sited domestically.

Basic Industry. The law would allow any Green Fields factory domestically sited for chemicals, oil and gas, steel, mining, aerospace satellite and cable systems and other domestic fabrication facilities. Metal-In-The-Ground, Metal in the Sky and Celluloid in the Can (now digital).

Technology. All plant and equipment qualifying under Basic Industry plus new software and internet sites, provided such investment is domestically sited and strictly adheres to the spirit of Department of Labor guidelines regarding outsourcing and pay parity for domestic vs. Visa workers.

BioTech. All Green Fields Biotech research facilities will qualify the same as Basic Industry,
Research in Biotech is increasingly offshore.

Green Energy Facilities. Electric Generation utilizing green energy credits at federal or state level creating more than 50MG/Watts or greater in electricity or caloric equivalent.

Water Distribution Utilities. New Water Extraction and Distribution to Arid Climates. Water extraction and distribution to areas with less that 20 inches of rain fall annually domestically.This investment includes pipelines, aqueducts and wells.

Regulation. The IRS must specifically object on the grounds of intent to avoid economic substance in the IPO and must object within 30 days of the Initial Letter. SEC and agency may object subject to 30 day disapproval.
Disapproval must include conclusive proof of intent to avoid economic substance and transparent regulatory violations in the IPO. No intent to avoid post IPO review by regulators.

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The idea of incentives set up against higher tax rates is a policy that predates TEFRA, before 1986. What I am advancing hers is a return to targeted incentives, the world before 1986, or the 1985 world in Back to the Future. What is new is the EFAB, my idea.

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I am one who wants a job. I began putting out apps years ago when my on-an-as-need-basis job began to diminish due to increased competition. I am currently employed part time and collecting unemployment, which has decreased this year to almost nothing. I have a couple of things working against me. I am nearing early retirement age and I have no specific marketable skill. Now throw in the recession which has cut back jobs. On top of that, pile on all the new immigrants and Illegals who are added to our population daily. I am angry. I am frustrated. I write my congressmen and our administration constantly to complain about illegal immigration. Do they listen? No. Apparently the livelihood of families who are here illegally are much more important to our government. To hell with people such as I who have no children or grandchildren to move in with or help out. Yeah, that's another thing. Since I didn't ever marry I made sure I never got pregnant. Now I look around at all these welfare families, legal and not, who are pumping out babies like a pezz machine while I pay for it with my taxes. That angers me too!

Our government needs to stop the flood of Illegals and lessen the number of new legal immigrants. They especially need to stop allowing foreigners to come here strictly to fill a position because "we don't have the talent in this country." What a crock! We have all the talent we need here. Believe it. Otherwise, why do all the foreigners come here for their education?

As for our government "creating jobs." All I have heard about is construction, building roads. Sorry but as a poised, feminine lady who is nearing retirement, I do not want to be on a road construction crew! We need to penalize any business that outsources to another country! Harshly! Bring jobs home. (And stop importing from China! They are going to poison us all!)

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has much more to do with corporate mind lock, mentality than anything and because they can get away with age discrimination and absolutely nothing happens to these employers, no fines, no legal cases lost, no sanctions, not even a scolding.

The perception is older people cost more, are less compliant and god knows what else that is not in reality at all.

No doubt about it in STEM, there is clearly vast age discrimination going on, we see it all over the place, start-ups must be "young", job ads which want "young" and on and on.

Illegal immigrants who often do not have even high school are not taking these jobs, although the flood of foreign labor sure is enabling this kind of age discrimination.

That said, age discrimination across all occupations is so horrific and it's disgusting how it goes even unchallenged by the press, and by politicians.

If only we could enact the same discrimination against Politicians, all of 'em would be out of a job and maybe then they would wake up to what is going on.

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We are granting approximately 70,000 green cards every month to legal immigrants and tolerating at least 7 million illegal aliens working in the US while millions of US workers are seeking employment and millions more have simply given up.

From 2000 to 2010, the native working age population grew by 13.5 million; the working age population for immigrants - legal and illegal – grew by 6.9 million. In 2010, 1.1 million fewer working age natives held jobs than in 2000. In 2010, 4.5 million more immigrant workers - legal and illegal - held jobs than in 2000. It's not hard to see why we have a long-term jobs crisis, is it?

I doubt that anybody who is reading this posting has never interviewed for a job. So when you get into the waiting room, what do you what to see - 20 people waiting to be interviewed or 3 or 4? The more people applying for a job the less likely you are to be hired, especially at the salary you would like.

I am a liberal who has voted Democratic probably 95% of my voting life but I am tied of environmentalists who support all sorts of measures to conserve/cut energy use who then wipe out all gains made by supporting the addition 1 million+ immigrants per year, not to mention supporting amnesty for 11 million+ illegal aliens. I am tired of people who lament the uptick in poverty then support the wholesale importation of poverty via amnesty and family reunification. If an immigrant has low skills and a poor education, how likely is it that his brother is going to be any different? I am tired of liberals who wring their hands over the increasing inequality in the US and then support granting amnesty to 1.2+ illegal aliens, most of whom have no education past HS and who approve handing out 70,000 green cards a MONTH, all of which served to keep un-underemployment high and wages - skilled and unskilled - depressed.

This isn't xenophobia or hatred of immigrants - it's simple economics: The law of supply and demand. It's all about the numbers.

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Plain text

immigrant numbers are very tough for our government refuses to track on immigration status, being "foreign born" means people brought over as infants, guest workers, illegals and naturalized citizens, green card holders. That said, you all have burnt me out on this attack on this article with illegals are stealing our jobs pounding. So, when I get up to the task I will pull some of the numbers I can estimate as valid. Right now, you're missing the increasing aging native population.

Example, we have absolutely not verified tally of the number of guest workers in the country and that's unconscionable of our government since guest workers have a direct impact on domestic labor markets.

Most green cards go to family based immigration (you all refer to this as chained migration).

Sigh. For now this thread is closed to more of these posts, yeah, ok, we get your point and I'll have to go do some number crunching and gather about statistics as I can obtain which are valid.

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I Noticed you eliminated the month of January, for your calculation. I realize the reason you left it out, but in my opinion, since these are people which do increase the population, I feel they should be counted. If you include the month of January, what would be the average monthly number of jobs needed to keep up with population growth?

Thank you, MGB

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I have posted a petition to the White House which might encourage them to more honestly address U.S. population growth. It needs 150 signatures to go to the publicized (national) listing of petitions.
If I can get on the public page and get 25,000 more signatures in 30 days, the White House promises to publicly respond to the fact that we are expected to reach half a billion people within the next fifty years.

Be one of the first 150 to launch this innovative approach to getting Washington to hear the concerns of the people. And please support this effort by forwarding this message to friends and family.
You can read my petition here, and then register with We the People to sign it and move it forward.

http://wh.gov/XykU

Many thanks in advance for taking a few minutes to register and sign the petition.

Mark Powell

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Obama's January inauguration will precede a measured economic recovery in 2013.

That’s the good news.

The bad news: this scenario might be as good as it gets. The upcoming recovery won’t boost middle- and working-class households in a meaningful way. It won't be a sustained, permanent fiscal recovery.

But this isn't necessarily the Obama administration’s fault. Since the 2008 fiscal meltdown, government officials, policy experts, and financial gurus of all stripes and credibility levels have rolled out any number of ideas aimed at solving our continuing financial crisis and revitalizing the economy.

Little has worked so far. The lack of significant job creation and its twin symptom of high unemployment, stagnant or dropping wages, stagnant or dropping worker productivity, decreased consumer spending and its twin symptom of increased household debt, and volatility in the housing market are all side effects of something much larger.

Policy makers are focused on the symptoms, not the problem. The real problem is far more fundamental and systemic than a few leading economic indicators.

And this fundamental problem is invisible to nearly everyone.

This unseen, and therefore unaddressed, problem means that an even bigger and longer-lasting crisis -- a true economic tsunami -- lies ahead for the world as a whole, not just the U. S. Industries around the globe will continue to shed valued (and valuable) jobs, in turn harming consumer-driven economies and creating a self-sustaining downturn.

This downturn will continue until the world economy either "breaks" permanently -- or the fundamental problem is recognized and addressed.

At its heart, the flaw is our mistaking efficient markets as being effective markets and failing to recognize the significant and profound difference.

The solution starts with acknowledging that domestic manufacturing needs to be the backbone of any significant economic recovery.

There's more to say, but I likely need a longer-form venue...

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